Had a tonsillectomy in 1958 as a young kid. Total cost was $200 for one night in hospital and everything. What would it cost today? Minimum wage was about $1 back then, but that dollar was worth a huge amount more than minimum wage today.

Common table salt is all you need. Add it to warm water and don't spare the salt. As long as the wound is open so the salt can get in you're good. I've had blood poisoning twice and it worked like a charm both times.

Here's a basic over-view of the "free" health-care available, Nevada "Medicare is the scheme that gives Australian residents access to health care. To help fund the scheme, most taxpayers pay a Medicare levy of 1.5% of their taxable income, over the tax-free threshold. Your Medicare levy is reduced if your income is below a certain threshold and in some cases you may not have to pay the levy at all. The thresholds are higher for seniors. If your income is above the thresholds, you may still qualify for a reduction based on your family taxable income."

Individuals and families can also opt for a higher level of private health insurance cover, to avoid having to wait to have operations that are deemed to be non life-threatening. The cost of this higher insurance cover is a redeemable tax deduction, and the govt encourages everyone to take out private cover, by sweetening the pot with incentives.

Certain medications are on list of govt-funded (not free) drugs, and some medications must be paid for in full.

It does seem to be a total mess in the US (and UK, I've heard). Things aren't totally effective in Australia either, but we have options, which every so-called developed nation should have. Choices are a part of any intelligent debate.

I'd still like to see more focus on the effects of diet and lifestyle, on our own health. Our AMA seems to be in denial about that connection, however obvious is seems to be in other literature available.

We need to educate everyone (children in particular) that fast food is not a staple diet, and the nutrient value is close to zero in a lot of people's daily habitual eating. If fast food makes up most of your weekly intake of kilojoules (calories metric) then you are guaranteed to become chronically ill, and a lifelong burden upon your own family, as well as society, and the health system.

I neglected to mention these "super clinics". They're like mini-hospitals, with several doctors in attendance, some 24 hours. To attract more clientelle, these clinics often offer a "bulk-billing" service, where the customers don't pay upfront at all. Usually a non-hospital doctor's visit will cost about fifty dollars, and you get about thirty-five dollars of that back from Medicare, but to save a lot of paperwork at Medicare, doctors can "bulk-bill" for patient visits, getting slightly less money, but they don't have to handle cash at all, so there's benefits for them, like not having to worry about being held up by criminals.

Let me know if there's anything else you need to know about the system. My sister works in fraud detection for Medicare. Interesting line of work, she says.

Incredible increases in the cost of care. Seems to me the DIY approach to emergency care, at least in the cases outlined in the article, make more sense. Super glue works great I hear, although I've never used it before.

What I find kind of amusing is, the more people avoid hospitals, it seems - based on my basic economic understanding - that costs will inevitably continue to increase. Not sure there is an end in sight to this other than changing the game entirely.

I don't think it's the doctors or nurses as much as the corporate hospital chains. The hospital corporations are profit oriented. For example, I'm om medicare and have supplemental insurance. Two months ago I went to ER for a bad belly ache. They did some lab work and took some pictures. Turned out to be a minor problem. They gave me some antibiotics. But the pictures showed a growth on my kidney. They wanted to put me in the hospital and remove the kidney6. I said no, I wanted to talk to my family doctor first. A couple days later I talked to my doctor and he looked at the pictures, He said it wasn't that bad and nothing needed to be done right now. He said he's just monitor it. My point is it seems hospitals will perform unnecessary procedures just for the money. They new I could pay and wanted to do an unneeded procedure.